Another week of WWE wrestling is in the books. The highly promoted draft started this Friday, securing the fates of dozens of superstars and leaving a handful of others to just kind of float around until WWE.com assigns them a Hogwarts house. The draft will conclude Monday night, but let’s take a look at some of the shenanigans our favorite (and least favorite) wrestlers got into this week.
Get Cucked
My personal favorite storyline in professional wrestling continued this week, with Bobby Lashley and Lana taunting Rusev some more. We saw Lashley hanging out in the Bulgarian’s house, his robe, his wife. Rusev, emboldened with the power of watching another dude make out with his wife, then destroyed Corbin and Orton for laughing at his heartbreak. He could feel the betrayal coursing through his veins, the image of Bobby Lashley’s tiny little briefs burned into his brain. I am living for this story.
Big Boy Szn
Tyson Fury returned to WWE to demand an apology from Braun Strowman and wear the same design on his shirt, pants, and hat. Braun, like every other man I’ve met, refused to apologize, and the two got into another scuffle, this time with the whole locker room coming out to restrain them. These men are set to bump big heads at Crown Jewel, in a match where the best promotion I could give is “it’s going to happen, and I guess I’ll probably watch it.”
On the SmackDown side, another big bald bad man is going to attempt to wrestle. Cain Velasquez and Brock Lesnar will face off for the WWE Championship at Crown Jewel, with Heyman hyping up the history between the two. If you know or care anything about UFC I guess this is interesting, but I only watch silly fake sports.
Draft Drama
It’s time for the big sister of the Superstar Shakeup to take over. Roman Reigns and Seth Rollins had the opening match of the night, where the winning would determine which brand got first pick in the draft. Things were going swimmingly until our techie friend The Fiend hit the lights, and climbed through the ring to attack Seth. He dragged Seth down into his hidey hole with him, causing a DQ win and giving Raw the first pick as a result of The Fiend’s sneakiness. What a company man.
Draft picks were standard, expected fare. I know the rounds don’t really mean anything, but the idea that anyone would go Drew McIntyre over Sasha Banks was a little hard to believe. A couple surprises— The Fiend is on SmackDown, presumably putting an end to his dream of making Rollins eat his fingers. After their match at Hell in a Cell, this is probably the right call to bring some threat back to Wyatt.
Raw |
Smackdown |
|
| Round 1 | Becky Lynch | Roman Reigns |
| The OC | The Fiend | |
| Drew McIntyre | ||
| Round 2 | Randy Orton | Sasha Banks |
| Ricochet | Braun Strowman | |
| Bobby Lashley | ||
| Round 3 | Alexa Bliss | Lacey Evans |
| Kevin Owens | The Revival | |
| Natalya | ||
| Round 4 | The Viking Raiders | Lucha House Party |
| Nikki Cross | Heavy Machinery | |
| The Street Profits |
Screw Them Kids
Bayley and Charlotte faced off in a HIAC rematch, and the story was once again about Bayley’s turn to the dark side. She performed her usual entrance, before taking a hint from wig legend Sasha and doing a dramatic reveal of her brand new dark bob haircut, which some of us have been rocking for a while but okay. She then demolished the Bayley Buddies, hacking them down before making a beeline for Charlotte in the ring. This aggressive version of Bayley is great; you could really feel the difference in her style. She got the win with a quick roll up, giving an early end to the Queen’s 10th reign. Turns out when she cut off her hair she also cut off her feelings, as she got on the mic and called the audience bitches and told them to screw themselves. You love to hear it.
Green All Over
Something is in the water, as Bayley wasn’t the only lady to embrace her dark side this week. The new Women’s tag team champs the Kabuki Warriors faced Becky and Charlotte in a fantastic tag team match on Raw, showing off their new style and attitude. A heel Asuka and Kairi has a lot of promise, and it’s great to see them pose a real threat to the women’s division. Kairi has been such a pure babyface for her run in NXT and her brief time on Raw, it’s fun to see her poke people in the eye and give her best evil cackle. After some very good back and forth between both teams, with Becky and Charlotte seeming to get the upper hand, Asuka spit some more green mist at Becky, giving Kairi the opening to win the match with a rollup. Very excited to hear them insult me in Japanese again next week, super into that.
Small Boys Only
205 Live returned this week, much to the joy of myself and Oney Lorcan’s twitter account. Tom Phillips is back on commentary with Aiden English, and the two covered Lio Rush’s defeat of Drew Gulak this past week on NXT. 205 seems like it’s kind of an amalgamation of a bunch of things right now, with the title falling under NXT and various members of its roster being eligible for the draft. Regardless, these short kings delivered like they always do, with a tag match that saw Team One Two pick up another victory over Gulak and Nese and a no DQ main event, where Mike Kanellis helped Brian Kendrick beat Tozawa. Lorcan and Burch are great additions to the 205 roster, and help bridge the gap between the cruiserweights and NXT a little more.
WWE Banger of the Week: Natalya vs Lacey Evans, Last Woman Standing
I can’t believe how much I actually enjoyed this match. Right from the bell both women tore each other apart, and it was awesome. I haven’t seen two blonde women beat the shit out of each other like this since I went to my first fraternity-sorority mixer. They brought out tables, trash cans, and even threw each other into the stage. For a rivalry that was beat to death, this was a fun way to end it. Lacey dominated for most of it, with Natalya popping back up to her feet at 9 like the final boss that just won’t die. The finish came when Natalya threw Lacey off the stage, finally keeping her down for the 10 count.
